Free Relapse Prevention Worksheets

14 relapse prevention workbooks from US Drug Rehab Centers

Tipping Points

A tipping point happens when many small events and rational reasons add up and lead to a paradigm shift or a shift in focus so the world never looks the same to you ever again. Here is an example of how a tipping point can happen.

Until the early 1970’s, smoking was acceptable everywhere. Nothing happened to change this. Gradually, small pieces of information started forming and circulating. Health problems were made public and restrictions on advertising began. By the mid 1980’s many small events and pieces of information added up. People rapidly began changing how they thought about smoking, and then the dam burst. Within a two to three year period, smoking was banned on airplanes and in most public workplaces. Restaurants designated non-smoking areas. On TV shows and in movies, nobody wanted to be seen smoking. It seemed that only the bad guys or immature adolescents still smoked. The world view of the majority of society had gone through a tipping point. Smoking as an accepted behavior was going downhill fast. Every year the number of smokers in Canada and the United States is less. No matter what any advertising firm may try, smoking will never appear so cool to so many people again.